Koch-Backed Group Warns Chris Christie

Source: Mother Jones

Conservatives are peeved at New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a GOP favorite, for praising President Barack Obama response to Hurricane Sandy days before the election. Some right-wingers even blame Christie for boosting the president's prospects at the last minute. (Christie hugged Obama! How could he?!) Now, in the aftermath of the election, a powerhouse conservative outfit partly funded by the billionaire Koch Brothers is coming after Christie on another front, sharply questioning whether the governor will sell out conservatives in the latest battle over Obamacare.

The New Jersey Legislature passed a bill on October 18 creating a state-based online health insurance marketplace; it did so because under Obamacare a state must either create its own insurance marketplace or let the federal government do it. Christie vetoed a similar state-based insurance exchange bill in May, but he said last month he wouldn't decide what to do about the new bill until after Election Day.

Enter the New Jersey chapter of Americans for Prosperity, the Koch-backed conservative grassroots group. AFP-New Jersey is pressuring Christie to reject the state exchange bill and rebuff Obamacare's requirements before November 16, the date by which states must submit its health insurance plans to the federal government. Here's what AFP-New Jersey Steve Lonegan had to say about Christie in a press release zapped out two days after the election:

-snip-

Other conservative governors across the country like Bobby Jindal, Rick Perry, Scott Walker, and others have already taken a principled stand. Where is Governor Christie? Will he stand with them? Will he prevent New Jerseyans from having their health care choices controlled by federal bureaucrats? Will he allow our state’s struggling businesses to be hammered by Obamacare's tax penalties with unemployment hovering around 10 percent? Or will he continue to go along to get along with Barack Obama?

9. Why do they care? Are they just mean pricks or what?

44. Because if people get to go to the doctor,

and the Dem's made it happen, that's less votes for the GOP, who only ACTION once elected is to try and ban abortion, and CUT TAXES for the people like the Koch Brothers.

This healthcare bill is FAR from perfect, but when it goes 100% live, it will "go viral" as well, and the GOP knows that they will not be able to handle the fallout. They will start losing Congressional races bigtime. Remember, it's only in the last 20 years or so that Congress has been mostly Republican-controlled most of the time...before that, the Legislative Body was SOLIDLY a Democratic Majority since the day FDR got elected. THAT'S where America REALLY is, in the modern and post-modern ages.

58. unless he "goes Romney" & does constant etch-a-sketches

3. Maybe it's the wine, but ...

Isn't this kind of weird? The right wants Christie to join other Republican governors who refused to set up state exchanges, so that he can "prevent New Jerseyans from having their health care choices controlled by federal bureaucrats." But if New Jersey doesn't set up its own exchange, the federal "bureaucrats" will do it for them.

What am I not understanding about their logic?

It's the law. They can't undo Obamacare at the state level. Are they nuts or did I drink too much wine at dinner?

4. I don't know about your level of inebriation...

but you are correct the republican governors who gave the finger to Obamacare by refusing to create state exchanges have just invited the hated "federal bureaucrats" to control New Jerseyans health care choices.

It looks good to the dumbass demographic to stand up to big gubmint, but in the long run it's going to screw the very people who are cheering for it.

38. What's ironic is these GOP governor's do not get that they are creating universal healthcare

If every state created an exchange, then there would be no "laboratory" wherein the federal government could start to demonstrate it's role under universal healthcare. By having some states create an exchange, we get to see which model works best here in the U.S. A centralized system similar to the NHS in the UK, or a system similar to that which exists in say Switzerland.

59. Sexual innuendo is getting to be so yesterday

Really just telling it like it is has'ta be the way to go. Like just putting it out there with truth is so much better. They are treasonous turn-coats who would sell their soul and mother for a dime or two (okay then, i am not very good at vitriol but i do know what worn out cliche sounds like)

And thanks for pointing that out ldf, that point sounds well taken to me.

26. Rebrand the GOP as the Koch Party. Just get it over with. Eliminate the middle men.

27. This should be fun!

Christie HATES being told what to do! Besides, if he plans on running for re-election in 2013, fighting "Obamacare" in a state he won by 17 points is probably not the best idea. Right now, NJ loves him because he handled Sandy like a grown-up and put politics aside. If he starts playing partisan games again, it will hurt him in his own state.

Of course, he may not run for re-election and focus on 2016, in which case he'd need the Koch brothers ... but their money may not even help him because he's already hated by the RWNJs for praising Obama. Sane people don't do too well in GOP primaries.

61. I think either way Christie is screwed

If he signs the bill the Koch brothers will run a blowhard right wing nutjob against him. If he vetoes the bill, then the federal government will step and set up the exchange and people will think he is spineless.

62. For people who are supposedly libertarian-Republicans,

the Koch Brothers sure do suck at keeping their nose out of other people's business. They've spent a crapload of money in states they don't even live in on propositions and buying Congresscritters, just so they can continue hoarding as much cash as possible from everybody else.

52. Precisely. Christie will love this "threat". nt

54. Christie knows that if he holds up health care any longer he will lose next year.

The day he put his arm around President Obama was the day he shifted his big butt to the middle. Christie saw the writing on the wall and NJ is really a Blue State even if it elects a Puke for Gov now and then. That is usually after a particularly bad Dem held the office.

His only hope is to start shifting his policies and rhetoric to the middle as fast as he can.